After two recent fires at a homeless encampment in Elgin, the city council unanimously agreed on Wednesday to move people living there to a hotel for the winter.
Residents of “Tent City,” a roughly 8-acre area on the west bank of the Fox River, will be offered rooms at the Lexington Inn & Suites for four months, and the site will be cleared and remediated.
“I think this is a big, bold undertaking and I’m proud that Elgin is working toward a solution,” council member Carol Rauschenberg said.
The city’s agreement with Litchfield Motel, Inc., the business operating the hotel at 1585 Dundee Ave., calls for a block of 50 rooms for four months at $65 per day for single occupancy. Provisions in the agreement will provide scaled rates for partnered individuals and those with pets.
The projected shelter cost if all 50 rooms are used is $3,250 per night, or $390,000 for the 120-day period, though that doesn’t include potential damages or incidental expenses.
The agreement includes a not-to-exceed cost of $425,000, and the city won’t have to pay for unused rooms.
Tent City in Elgin runs along railroad tracks used by Metra and the Canadian Pacific Kansas City Southern Railroad. The location of the train tracks made it difficult for firefighters to battle two recent fires.
Brian Hill/[email protected]
The city will use multiple funding sources to pay for the project. About $614,400 remains from a $940,000 allocation approved in 2022 to address homelessness.
In addition, Elgin has been awarded a $400,000 Safe Spaces, Healthy Minds Affordable Housing grant through the Kane County Health Department. However, the city is working with the KCHD to determine how much of the grant is applicable for shelter expenses.
Assistant City Manager Karina Nava said the city has been collaborating with local social support agencies and the faith community in conjunction with the relocation so Tent City residents will continue to have access to services.
“We know this is a temporary solution,” she said. “These people have been through a lot, they’re in a very vulnerable state and we want to help them as much as possible. It’s time to act.”
Tent City sits on roughly 8 acres between the Fox River and Route 31 in Elgin.
Brian Hill/[email protected]
Elgin Police Chief Ana Lalley said the department and the city’s homelessness coordinator will begin canvassing the Tent City area during the second week of January to notify people of their options and of the planned relocation to the hotel, which will begin on or about Jan. 20.
She said people will be allowed to leave on their own or be transported to the hotel. Anyone who remains will be considered trespassing.
“I want to stress that the departments’s philosophy of respectful, humane and thoughtful approach will be ever-present in this assessment,” she said.
After the individuals residing in Tent City have been relocated to the Lexington or another suitable indoor shelter, the city will secure the area in preparation for a cleanup of the site, which will be done by an outside specialist vendor.
“There will be zero tolerance for encampments following the work that’s necessary to provide the relocation and remediation at Tent City,” City Manager Rick Kozal said.
Parks Superintendent Greg Hulke estimated the cost of the challenging cleanup at between $2 million and $2.5 million, with the process taking two to four months.
Tent City extends north to the Fox River Water Reclamation District treatment facility and south to almost Kimball Street. Railroad tracks shared by Metra and the Canadian Pacific Kansas City Southern Railroad bisect the area.
The site has been used for encampments by persons experiencing homelessness since a shuttered metal fabrication factory there was demolished in 1990.
The Elgin Police Department believes there are 60 to 70 active encampments in the area, though no more than 25 people have been found there by police at the same time during recent visits.
Drone photos supplied by the Elgin Fire Department show the damage done by recent fires in the Tent City homeless encampment in Elgin.
Courtesy of the City of Elgin
A substantial fire within the Tent City area on the evening of Dec. 4, followed by another late-night fire just over a week later, spurred the city to take action. Fire Chief Robb Cagann said the fire department has responded to Tent City 47 times since the start of 2023, including 14 times for fires and 21 times for medical calls.
Cagann said the second instance of a fire with combustible materials within the damaged area in such a short period of time indicates people were using dangerous makeshift heating devices that pose a threat to both encampment residents and the general public in an area where fires are difficult to fight.
While no residents or firefighters were injured and only a small number of people were displaced by the fires, Cagann said that a dog killed in the second fire was a sign that things could have gone much worse.
“This highlights the real world dangers associated with fires and structures with lots of flammable materials … that we find in this encampment that lead to rapid fire development and which can preclude people from being able to escape,” he said.
Elgin estimates it will cost over $2 million to clean up the Tent City area once the residents are relocated.
Brian Hill/[email protected]